For the last couple of weeks,Ready or Notdeveloper VOID Interactive has been unable to escape the community’s ire. After announcing that it would be tweaking certain elements to retain the game’s ESRB rating, fans kicked up a fuss about ‘censorship’, claiming that VOID had ruined everything that made Ready or Not so gritty and realistic.
While the (very few) changes were minor, giving female hostages underwear and swapping a convulsing child for a sleeping one, the backlash was fierce enough to sparka widely successful review bombing campaign(anda much less successful boycott).
However, one glance at the subreddit and the community appears to have moved on already. Sure, the game still sits at ‘Mostly Negative’ on Steam, and there’s the odd comment here and there (often heavily downvoted), but it still enjoys an active playerbase, while most forum posts are from newcomers eager to get stuck in with the console launch.
“I Am So Hyped”
“ONLY 1 MORE DAY,“u/Fit-Internal8550 posted, counting down the hours on PS5. “Just pre-ordered today,“u/Lagoon2024 said, attaching a screenshot of them installing the game on Xbox. “We are sooooo close! I cannot wait!“another thread from u/Sea_Opportunity9850 reads, again accompanied by a countdown. This is just a snippet of the sentiment among fans right now, with many more threads like this cheering on the game’s launch.
What really sums up the change in attitude is how many posts there are about the New Zealand trick, with players asking if they can get into the game even a few hours early.
But what’s interesting is how much more welcoming the community has been in the last couple of days.
Ever since the backlash began, there’s been a strange one-sided feud between PC players and the upcoming console community, as many were quick to pin the blame for VOID’s “censorship” on PS5 and Xbox, arguing that the mere existence of the ports is a problem. Reviews even poked fun at the “unwashed console masses”, stating that they didn’t want cross-play in the first place, and especially not now with the sacrifices VOID has had to make. But even those attitudes are finally being drowned out.
“Most of us PC players are actually excited [that you’re] about to receive what’s probably the darkest, most immersive tactical shooter on console,” u/SammerSHAK said to 375 upvotes. “Enjoy the game, and ignore all the hate.” Plenty of comments like this can be found across the subreddit, with only a few stragglers still bitterly pointing fingers at console. Even then, they’re being downvoted en masse. It’s a stark contrast from what we’ve seen in the run-up to launch so far.
